This is from our humorous friend « Cyclops, » of the Mataura Ensign: For some years past now I have seen where I lost many opportunities of getting value for my money. In one's calida juventa or salad days money was apt to flow out with an easy grace suggestive of a carelessness of consequences. In mature years a man is apt to regret such easy expenditure, and there accumulates in him a desire for revenge. This I judge is what has happened to the individual who inserted the marriage notice I am going to give you down below. This man had evidently seen an intimation in the paper that notices of marriages, births, or deaths would be inserted for a fee of three shillings, and he just took off his coat, put a wet towel round his head, and sailed in to get his money's worth. This is what he said:—

Gardner—Adams.—Solemnised on the 22nd February, 1887, by Archdeacon Coleman, in the Roman Catholic Church, Oamaru, Charles Robert Gardner, only son of Mr. John Gardner, carpenter, and Mrs. Francis Gardner, daughter of — Jennings, Esq., Nelson, to Olivia Margaret Maria Adams, second daughter of Anthony Adams, Esq., Ballinahinch, County Galway, Ireland, and Mrs. Catherine Adams, daughter of Mr. Joyce, a well-known gentleman farmer of the district; the late Miss Adams is grand-daughter of Peter Adams, Esq., Ballinahinch. Her god-mother is the wife of the Rev. Mr. Ashe, Rector of town of Roundstone; and godfather, Mr. Mears, living near there. Chief witnesses to marriage in Oamaru, brother, sister, and friend, viz.: Mr. Ambrose Adams, draper and hotelkeeper, Thames St., Oamaru, Miss Louisa Frances Adams, milliner and saleswoman, same street, and Mr. Arthur Parson O'Leary, Manager of Clothing Branch, Thames St., Oamaru. Home and Colonial papers please copy.

But the astute reader will notice that the newspaper man got level with the persecutor after all. This notice was published in the Kaikoura Star of the 12th inst., and had, I presume, been held over « on account of pressure on our space » for nearly four years. The paper man seems to me to have had the best of it.